Apparently, parking can be a problem anywhere

Parking is no longer just an issue for the mall or grocery store. Yes, oh yessss…..you know what I mean, just a major cluster of those drivers that believe parking lines is only a suggested area to park. Well apparently my kids have caught on to these wonderful parking skills!! Their logic, wherever it fits is where it sits. Which means 99% of the time that means…..PATIO PARKING….AND IN OUR WAY!!

Obviously, this does not work for us at all. I am just waiting for poor Jeff to trip and break his neck while we cook out. Sooo needless to say I have to get this under control!! You’d think with Jeff being the cop he would have handled this long ago, but since he is falling down on the job…..guess momma has to become parking patrol!! Hehe, just kidding (kinda).

After searching around on the wonderful web, I saw a few ideas that were pretty cute and would be great to do. But when it comes down to it, I just needed somethin’ simple and that I could make it with what I happened to have around here!!! Yep you called it….pallets, pallets and more pallets!! Those wonderful and handy lumps of lumber are a this DIY’ers dream!!!

Pallets, pallets & more pallets

Ok maybe not these eww

Once I found myself a good one that I could work with, needed to have some good slats with good spacing (less work for me to adjust later), it was time to test it out with all these modes of transport :). Needed to make sure they could be supported easy without worrying of them falling over, especially when training wheels come off.

Testing…..Testing…..yep….testing

Yay!!!! This pallet will work, great actually!! Now I just need to cut it down in size, in half actually. It is not necessary for me to use this entire pallet. I will get better use of the extra boards for another project later on. So while I am taking over on Kudzu Bug duty……

Kudzu patrol….

these things are sooo irritating!!GGRRRR!!!

…..Jeff is going to go ahead and cut the pallet it down for me. So I can get busy on the assembly.

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Yay…that actually went a lot quicker than it seemed, but ya know, I am pretty impatient when I get excited for a project. Now that the basic set for the bike rack is done, I am going to test spacing again just be cautious. Plus I need to test the angle of incline I want for the rack. Just to help with support when bikes and scooters and just sitting.

Spacing good…check

Angle for support good…check

Jeff found and old section of some pressure treated 4×4 post in the shed, so we cut it into three pieces for the feet. We only cut them to 5 inches long and had a 15 degree angle cut to allow rack to rest on properly. This just happen to be what worked for me, I have not found where it has any bearing on the actually main function of the this rack.

Old cut 4×4 cutoff as my feet

Screwed into the bottom slat to attach from the top

Now my least….and I mean ABSOLUTE LEAST favorite part. Sanding !!!!!!

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Remind me to apologize to Jeff for all the projects I have asked him to make for me when this is over. Especially for the ones that involved sooo much dang sanding!!!!! Geez!! Now that sanding was done I wiped it off really good to make sure I removed as much sawdust as I could. Normally we would use the air compressor to blow off the dust but it wasn’t out. You also don’t want to wipe it off with a wet rag….the moisture will the cause the grain in the wood to rise and which will cause you to have to sand again. So unless you enjoy sanding…..no wet rags!!!

Taped all the sides and feet….

protecting the black paint from the new colors

Now that it is wiped down, I went ahead and just painted the entire bottom with black spray paint. No specific reason for black, just wanting to use up some of these leftover partial cans of spray paint. Also got myself in a hurry and forgot to take a pic, but hey its no biggie. I did leave that to cure overnight so I could just pick up painting the next day.

Fast forwarding about 12 hours, its like we are in a time machine!!! Hehe, anyway I taped off the black edges so I could start coloring my top slats. No specific reason again for the colors, these are just ones that the girls liked that we had leftover from other projects of theirs. I didn’t get to crazy with it, I didn’t mind the spackle of colors all over each other. Reminded me of graffiti. Now I just need to let that cure for about 24 hours, it was calling for rain here so we put it in the garage to keep it out of moisture.

Mixing up some colors

Soo bright…..

I love how bright it is!!!! Goes so well with bikes!!! Yay!!! I am pleased!!!! Good thing was it was pretty much free for me to do, but even if I had to by supplies….it is a cheap project. Now lets just make sure they use this like they are supposed to.

Looks so much better

Nice and neat … for now.

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